File Permissions

Some Operating systems allow control over who can view, modify or execute files. This control is called 'file permissions'.

In Linux and Unix, there are three control levels.

a)User: this is username that owns the file

b)Group: This is the group to which the file is assigned

c)Other: This control level is for anyone else.

Each of these levels can have three type of access to the file:

a) Read - they can view or download the file
b) Write - they can modify the file
c) Exectue - This means they can run the file i.e. they can start the program.

Permissions for a file called myfile.exe look like this

xrw-r--r- myfile.exe

The first three character are for user/owner, in this case they can read (r) or write(w) or execute (x) the file called myfile.exe.
The next three is for Group, in this case they can only read the file and the final three is for Other, who in this case, can also only read the file.

2020-10